bill clinton did. it is a problem. remember, congress has to vote for every spending bill. it also has to vote to increase the debt ceiling. the president does not empower through the constitution to do those things unilaterally. host: explain wha the by policy -- what the bipartisan policy center is. guest: >> we are in washington, d.c. and we are bipartisan and not nonpartisan. we have democrats and republicans, former senators, former congressman, but mostly a lot of very senior staff who used to work for the white house and the senate and house. it was started by four former majority leaders of the u.s. senate, tom-0, howard baker, bob dole, and george mitchell. it is devoted to doing very intensive work and analytical work, then making recommendations on problems that are relevant right now legislatively. so we don't think about 45 years and now the relationship between taiwan and north korea. we don't do that. we have a problem coming up within the next year-and-a-half and here are the kind of political consequences and the debate we think will occur, this is how we c